The death toll from the May 12 earthquake in Sichuan Province stood at 69,197 for the sixth day in a row, as of Sunday at noon, the State Council Information Office said in a statement.

The number of injured also stood at 374,176, showing no change since July 2, while the number of missing dropped by 51 from Saturday's figure to 18,289 after the 8.0-magnitude quake jolted southwest China's Sichuan Province and neighboring regions on May 12.

As of Sunday noon, of the 96,446 injured people who had been hospitalized, 88,624 have recovered and left hospital while 5,173 people remained in hospital, the statement said.

The government disaster relief fund had topped 59.04 billion yuan (about US$8.56 billion), including 53.69 billion yuan from the central budget and 5.35 billion yuan from the local budget.

According to the Ministry of Civil Affairs, domestic and foreign donations came to about 57.29 billion yuan in cash and goods by Sunday noon, of which 20.9 billion yuan had been forwarded to the quake-hit areas.

About 1.58 million tents, 4.87 million quilts, 14.1 million garments, 1.96 million tons of fuel oil and 4.19 million tons of coal had been sent to the quake-hit area, it said.

As of Saturday, relief workers had built 487,300 temporary houses and another 22,600 were being installed, while the materials for 39,800 of such shelters had arrived in the affected areas.

In the 24 hours ending at mid Sunday, 250 aftershocks were monitored in the quake zone, all below magnitude 3.9, according to the China Earthquake Administration.

A total of 17,441 aftershocks had been detected since May 12.

(Xinhua News Agency July 14, 2008)